Screamer
by Tineke
Summary: Mal/River friendship. "Sometimes you just need someone to hold you so the nightmares go away".


River knows she's a real girl. Actual and whole. But that knowledge doesn't stop the nightmares. The Reavers are still embedded in her mind, pacing and growling, and filling her mind with blood. She can feel the sticky warmth of it running down her arms, taste it, it stings her eyes, but she's the only one who knows.

She can't go to Simon. He'd want her to, but he's with is Kaylee. He doesn't say it to her, but she can feel his relief that she's sane enough to allow him to pursue what he's pretended he didn't want. He's happy with his little engine girl, and River doesn't want to pull him away from her. She likes Kaylee, but she knows that Kaylee's still scared of her, even if Kaylee doesn't realise it. But she talks the engine the same way River talks to people. It doesn't take words.

River doesn't want to sleep, not when the Reavers are so loud, because she knows she'll dream of blood, and flesh, and things she's never seen with her eyes because she never wanted to. When she's honest with herself she knows she didn't expect to come out of the fight alive. She'd never used her training knowingly before. She prefers to pretend it's not there. She just knew that if she didn't start running there'd be no chance of anyone else living. And she'd been pulling them this way and that for so long. So she ran, and she fought, and she lived. But the minds of the Reavers had pressed in against hers, screaming, obscene, and just so _many_. They'd pressed their way in, and they'd stay there for a long, long time.

So River didn't sleep, not when they were this loud. Instead she lays on her bed and stretches her mind out. Simon and Kaylee aren't sleeping, so she avoids them, and Jayne dreams of nothing, so she glosses over him. Wisps of wistful images pull her towards Zoë , who dreams of her husband. River watches Wash smile, through Zoë 's eyes. Her mind is a whirlpool of grief, and anger, and River has to pull out before she gets sucked in. She wonder how she can focus every day, push herself through every second without her husband when she feels that _loss _so acutely. River wishes she could send her a sweeter dream.

Then she captures wind of other nightmares, and she's thrown into the sounds, and smells, and sights of battle. She's seen this dream before, she saw it before she knew she could Read, back when she didn't understand where these images that weren't hers came from, when any level of involvement in what Zoë was dreaming now would've left her shaking, and weeping for days, unable to understand why she cared this much. But she knew this dream now, knew the look in the Captain's eyes as he watched everything he'd believed in die. He wasn't the Captain in this dream, he was the Sergeant, and the difference was easy to see. And the moment where the Sergeant died was even easier to find.

The dream abruptly ended, as the Captain woke, and she was thrust back into her own mind, only to find that as her consciousness had stalked the ship, her body had slept, and the Reavers were waiting, leaping up to tear into her, hold her down, and it _hurt,_ but it wasn't real, but, oh, it _felt_…

She woke without sound, but her head was screaming. She needed someone, Simon! No… She stumbled from her bed, out of her room, across the ship. She followed the traces of nightmares, the smell of blood, and steel, and she found him in the cockpit. He must have heard her coming, because he stood up when she came in, she could see herself through his eyes, and she almost ran, but then in a burst of realisation she knew he _understood_. And he did, and she didn't know how it happened but she ended up across the room, held against his chest, hoping her couldn't feel her shaking, even as she knew he could. Somehow they ended up back in the chair, and she was curled up in his lap, fingers clutching and releasing the material over his shoulders, and somehow, _somehow_, he knew she didn't need words.

Her tears dried on her face, and she pulled back, still shaking, but the screaming in her head was quieter, enclosed in bars at the back of her mind.

"Thank you". It was all she could think to say, even though it didn't seem like enough, "Sorry."

He smiles, "S' not your fault, darlin', we all have nights like this."

She tries to return the smile but it doesn't come, "I'm not supposed to bother people. All grown up, shouldn't need to."

He stares out into the Black for what seems like a long times, and she wonders if he agrees with that, though she can't sense anything but the stars inside his mind.

"Grown up has nothin' to do with it. Everyone needs someone. Personally, I'm kinda glad you showed up tonight." His eyes are soft when he looks back at her.

Her smile is stronger this time, "You dream of war. It hurts because it's true. Sometimes you just need someone to hold you so the nightmares go away."

He nods, shadows she hadn't noticed darkening his face. "Exactly, darlin'. Exactly."

She wants to remove the shadows. He helped her, she wants to help him. "I dream of Reavers. They live in my head now, when they get out it hurts to sleep."

She knows he understands. The Reavers are caged, and gunfire no longer clouds his mind. His smile his light, and the shadows have retreated, though she can still see them, waiting for the dreams to return. Neither of them are healed, but just maybe they're on their way. She retreats to her own seat, curling her legs under her, and joins him in watching the stars, waiting for the night cycle to end. She knows that the crew will find them both sleeping there, come morning, but she knows that the nightmares won't return as long as she stays. So she and the captain smile into the black.


End file.
